Murder by Proxy (14 page)

“Sorry, Tim. I don’t think Herbert Harris is stupid. In fact, I’m beginning to believe he came awful damn close to committing a perfect crime.”

“You think he did it?”

“His wife is dead,” Shayne said flatly. “He stands to collect a hundred thousand dollars from an insurance policy. He isn’t too solvent, and he has another woman on the string. That’s just too damned many coincidences for me to stomach. Yes. I think Herbert Harris is our boy. And, by God, I’m beginning to get a faint glimmering of how he pulled it off.”

“How?” Lucy and Rourke spoke the word simultaneously. Shayne emptied his cup of cognac, marshaling his thoughts. He spoke very slowly, as though testing each word as he went along.

“Let’s suppose Mrs. Harris didn’t get on that plane at all in New York Monday afternoon. Suppose she was already dead in the New York apartment when the plane took off with Ruth Collins aboard, using Mrs. Harris’ ticket, carrying her luggage and handbag complete with credit card, and even wearing her rather distinctive wedding ring.

“When Harris gets back from the airport, after seeing Ruth off, it would be about time for him to put her in the trunk of his automobile, before rigor mortis set in. Ruth would make his alibi perfect. She plans to disappear Monday night, and he takes great care in New York to appear in the right places at the right times to make it impossible for him to have been in Miami either of those two crucial nights… as Gifford reported. He’s a partner in the brokerage firm, so it wouldn’t be too difficult for him to arrange the trip on Thursday night to Charleston. And it would appear perfectly natural for him to decide on the spur of the moment to drive on to Miami to spend the weekend with his wife.

“Wait a minute, Tim.” Shayne raised a big hand to still the reporter. “I know what you’re going to say, but let me think this out my own way. Ruth Collins had disappeared from the Beachhaven Monday night in a manner that makes two things pretty certain. One is, that no one will seriously look for her until Harris turns up and raises the alarm Saturday morning. The other is that when the body is found in the rented car, she has cleverly laid several false trails that Monday evening, and the police won’t really be surprised that she got herself murdered.

“Safest place to leave the rented car for a few days is in the hotel parking lot with a guest sticker on it. So we have Harris driving in from Charleston early Saturday morning, meeting his secretary with the convertible at a prearranged spot and transferring his wife’s body from his car to the convertible. She drives it back to the hotel lot and parks it again, and then goes back to wherever she’s been in hiding since Monday night. So, now we know why the face was beaten. To keep people who had seen Ruth Collins from failing to recognize the corpse. Harris knew damned well that fingerprints would prove the dead woman his wife. He had to have that in order to collect the insurance. How’s that for inspiration?” He beamed at them happily and refilled his cup, splashing cognac on his desk in the process.

“It’s a hell of an inspiration,” Rourke said sourly.

“Everything fits,” Shayne insisted. “Remember, there wasn’t any blood in the trunk of the convertible. And remember that the people at the hotel, who might get a look at the body, had only seen the supposed Mrs. Harris briefly a few days before. Gifford describes Ruth Collins as similar in coloring and size, so they would accept the dead body as the woman they had seen.”

“But the picture, Mike.” Rourke stabbed his finger at it angrily. “You promised you wouldn’t pull identical twins out of the hat.”

“He’s right, Michael,” Lucy agreed gravely. “For a minute I thought you almost had it. And there’s the red dress, too. It was identified as the one she wore out of the Beachhaven.”

“How can you identify a particular dress?” scoffed Shayne. “In fact, that’s another point in favor of my theory. In planning this whole thing, all Harris had to do was to order a duplicate of the red dress from the shop where she bought it, and have it in readiness to dress the corpse in before putting her in his car. Damn it, Tim! Remember you told me the M.E. said the shot fired into her heart had not penetrated the dress, and you suggested it could have been pulled aside to let the bullet enter. Sure, I suppose it could have been that way. But it’s a hell of a lot more likely that she was wearing something else when she was shot, and the red dress slipped onto her afterward.”

“There’s still the indisputable evidence of the picture. Both this one and the other pose Painter has got.”

“Not very much evidence is really indisputable, Tim. It’s just come clear to me, goddamn it!” He pounded the desk happily. “Your mention of Painter’s picture broke it through to me. Sure. Harris handed out two snapshots of his wife which he just happened to have in his wallet. But, what do we actually know about those pictures? Only that Harris said they were of his wife. Suppose they’re pictures of Ruth Collins instead? Now, by God, ultimate evaluations are perfectly clear.” He exultantly poured his cup full of cognac and drank half of it off with a triumphant flourish.

“Wait a minute, now.” Dawning comprehension was beginning to replace the stubborn disbelief on Rourke’s face. “By God, Mike. By God, it would work.”

Lucy was nodding too, and her face was rapt as she held out her cup. “Let me have one more drink and I think I’ll understand exactly what you’re talking about.”

Shayne poured her cup full. Timothy Rourke got to his feet slowly, his eyes glittering with happy excitement. “Harris is taking off for New York this afternoon. He told me he planned to drive straight through with maybe a stop-off for a few hours to sleep. His wife was cremated this morning. If we call Painter, it may not be too late to grab him.”

“On what grounds?”

“Well, hell. You just outlined the whole thing.”

“In theory, Timothy. What do you think Painter would say about one of Mike Shayne’s drunken theories? No, let Harris take off. He’s not going to disappear. He’s a very contented and happy man right now. Everything has gone off without a hitch as he planned. His wife’s body is cremated, and there’s a hundred grand check to be collected from the insurance company. We need a picture of Ellen Harris that we know
is
a picture of her. Get Tim Gifford on the phone, angel.”

Lucy went in to her desk to put the call through. Rourke looked at his watch, pacing the floor excitedly. “It’s too late to hit today’s edition.”

“Save it for tomorrow, and you’ll have the whole story with a picture of Ellen Harris to prove it.”

Shayne’s buzzer sounded and he lifted his phone. “Jim? One more small chore and we’re going to hang a murder rap on Herbert Harris.”

“But I’ve told you, Mike…”

“Forget everything you’ve told me. Just do this one thing. Get me a recent picture of Ellen Harris pronto and send it airmail special delivery. There should be plenty around, with her being an ex-model.”

“Sure. They showed me a batch at the agency where she used to work.”

“Get one of Ruth Collins, too, if you can. Be damn sure to mark each one of them carefully, which is which. But if you can’t get Collins in time, see that one of Mrs. Harris gets on a plane tonight. I’ll be waiting for it in my office tomorrow morning.”

Gifford said, “Will do,” and hung up. Shayne reached for the half-emptied bottle of Cordon Bleu and drank from the neck of it.

Michael Shayne reached his office at exactly nine o’clock the next morning, just as Lucy was unlocking the door. He was clear-eyed and cheerful, and when she mockingly said, “No hangover, Michael?” he looked properly shocked.

“On Cordon Bleu? That would be sacrilegious. By the way, when are you going shopping for office glassware?”

“Maybe when I go out for lunch.” She preceded him into the office, but he caught her by the arm and swung her about.

“Go get some now. I’m sure Tim will be along in a few minutes, and we should be getting a Special Delivery very soon. We’re going to have some celebrating to do and common, old paper cups just won’t do. Get some snifters. Not the big ostentatious kind, but regular ones… you know.” He cupped his hands to indicate the size.

Lucy laughed and said, “Genuine crystalware, I presume?”

“Nothing less. Get half a dozen, angel, to allow for breakage.” He pushed her out of the office exuberantly, and went through the door to gaze fondly at the cardboard case of Cordon Bleu still sitting in the middle of his desk.

When Lucy returned with a large paper-wrapped parcel half an hour later, she found Timothy Rourke sitting with her employer, and they had a single bottle of cognac on the desk in front of them with no paper cups in sight. The rest of the case had been modestly removed from sight, and Shayne said reproachfully, “We’ve been waiting, Lucy. It took you long enough.”

“No picture yet?”

Shayne looked at his watch. “Any minute now… if Jim got it on a plane.” He helped her open the package and take out half a dozen spherical glasses of thin, rock crystal, which she insisted on rinsing at the water cooler before allowing liquor to be poured in them. She dried and polished them lovingly with paper tissues from her desk, and set two of the shining receptacles in front of the cognac bottle just as a voice called, “Special Delivery,” from the outer office.

“Perfect timing,” beamed Shayne, reaching for the bottle. “Bring it in, angel.”

She hurried out, and reentered with a large manila envelope marked PHOTOGRAPHS. DO NOT BEND. She tore it open and pulled out two thin sheets of cardboard with two glossy studio photographs between them.

They were two poses of the same young woman. A very beautiful young woman… and very definitely the same young woman whose picture Herbert Harris had already furnished them.

The trio stared down at the two photographs in stricken silence. Shayne opened the center drawer of his desk and took out one of the blown-up prints of Ellen Harris and laid it beside the two which had just arrived.

There was not the faintest doubt in the minds of any one of the three that the same woman had posed for all of the pictures.

Shayne snorted loudly and lifted a snifter of cognac high into the air. “Here’s to more and better theories.” He drank deeply.

“That’s not the way to use a snifter,” Lucy protested. “You’re supposed to…”

“Right now, I’m supposed to seek inspiration,” Shayne told her grimly.

Timothy Rourke nodded solemnly and lifted his glass high. “To the clarification of ultimate evaluations,” and tossed half of it down.

“I don’t understand, Michael,” Lucy said hesitantly. “You made it all so clear and logical yesterday. And I thought about it during the night and I just
knew
you were right.” She puckered her forehead and looked down at the prints again, then drew in her breath sharply. “If one of those is of the secretary…” She turned them both over. On the back of each print Gifford had sent was printed boldly:
“Miss Ellen Terry one month before her marriage to Herbert Harris. Said to be an excellent likeness.”

“No such luck,” muttered Shayne. “No identical twins in this one.”

Lucy peered inside the Manila envelope and said, “There’s a note inside.” She withdrew a single sheet of paper with a typed message which she read aloud:

“Mike. I enclose two poses of Ellen Harris taken shortly before her marriage. Unable to locate a picture of the elusive Ruth Collins, but probably can, if you want me to keep trying. It’s signed, Jim,” she ended, dropping it to the desk.

Shayne grimaced and seated himself in his swivel chair. He leaned forward with his forearms on the desk, idly turning the cognac snifter in his hands. He said slowly, “I’ve always distrusted theorizing. But this one seemed to fit so damn perfectly. What else
does
fit?” he demanded. “Why did Ruth Collins disappear from New York last Monday afternoon, if she didn’t come down here masquerading as Ellen Harris? Where is she all this time, damn it? If that
was
Ellen Harris at the Beachhaven… and I guess there isn’t any doubt about it now… why did she set herself up as a sitting duck for murder? Don’t tell me,” he groaned, “that she loved her husband so much she set out deliberately to get herself bumped off, just so he could collect insurance on her and have his secretary, too. This, I refuse to accept.”

“I guess I haven’t got any new lead for today,” Rourke muttered morosely.

“Not unless Painter’s got one for you. Talked with him lately?”

“Just before I came here. For the first time in his life Petey cautiously admitted that all his clues had petered out. He’s about ready to mark it off as the work of a homicidal maniac.”

Shayne tossed off the rest of his cognac and set the fragile glass down gently. He lifted both of his palms to his face and said in a queerly subdued voice, “Both of you go in the other room. I’ve got thinking to do.” They looked at each other and Rourke shook his head and led the way out. Shayne sat there for a long time with bowed head and closed eyes. There was a faint smile of satisfaction on his rugged features when he got up and went into the outer room where Rourke was perched on the low railing, talking quietly to Lucy. They both looked up at him expectantly.

He said, “Call the airport, Lucy. Book me on the next jet flight to New York that has a vacancy.”

She nodded alertly and started dialling. Rourke slid off the railing and demanded, “Another brainstorm, Mike? You got another answer?”

Shayne said, “It’s a brainstorm all right.”

“What is it?”

Shayne shook his red head and said flatly, “No. I made a damned fool out of myself yesterday by jumping to conclusions without any proof.” He drew in a deep breath. “Think where I’d be today if I had let you call Painter and persuade him to hold Harris.”

“But you didn’t.”

“I shot off my mouth to you and Lucy,” Shayne growled. “I sat in there and guzzled cognac and outdid Sherlock Holmes with my deductive prowess. This one, I’m keeping strictly to myself.”

Lucy told him, “The first flight that has space will put you in International at four-forty this afternoon.”

He nodded and said, “Fix it. Then get Gifford on the phone.” He stalked back to his desk, picked up the cognac bottle and corked it tightly, deposited it in a drawer of a filing cabinet behind his desk. Turning back to see Rourke observing him from the doorway, he said with a wry smile: